Touched by an angel - John Johnson

When John Johnson discovered the roses he has voluntarily tended for years at the War Memorial in Webb Park, decapitated, his eyes teared. Last month, someone lopped off the tops of hundreds of roses, leaving them to die. Now, with his tender care, new buds appear. He fears another attack.

As a tribute to our local military, his heroes, John lovingly nips the dried leaves, trims the dead buds, and fertilizes the plants. He installs tiny flags at all of the headstones of our fallen, and rights them when they topple over. Silently, without a word of acknowledgment from anyone save an occasional complimentary passerby or a duck, John plies his love. The ducks all flock at his feet when he issues a low whistle, and remain while he works, glad of his company. He knows which ones are family, readily identifying three generations.

“These are my kids. Look, see that white pigeon,” John says, pointing to the plumpest pigeon I’d ever seen. “He doesn’t know he’s not a duck. He’s been hanging out with these guys for about six months, sharing their scraps, and they have accepted him into the group.”

“You notice how the water smells so bad here at the shallow end? The water level is down about a foot because of the mandated water cutbacks, it can’t reach the pump. It just becomes stagnant with only the intermittent waterfall at the other end, and a few jets, to circulate the water. You see all these fish feeding on the debris? Sometimes I bring a pool net and clean out what I can reach.”

When we reach the now silent waterfall, we see a woman seemingly taking water samples, and were eager to hear what improvements are planned.

“No, I’m not taking samples,” she laughs as her little girl is held back by a babysitter, ”I’m trying to catch a fish for my daughter to take home.” Horrified at the thought of taking anything from the polluted lake to her home, we encourage her to go down to the other end where there are plenty of fish. Hopefully, the site of the pollution will dispel any notion of taking a fish home!

When asked about the turtles basking on the rocks, John tells how he sample counted them, and estimates there are over three hundred - offspring of pets left off by former owners.

“When I see one wander out of the lake, I know he’s sick. Usually, they have a crustiness around the eyes. I take him to a nearby vet who cares for them for free,” John says.

As we scan the lake, a Koi fish cruises into view – it must be eighteen inches long, and John estimates five or six pounds! It has a companion, a cat fish that is a bit less visible than the white, black, and orange Koi, according to John. But, that is not the strangest thing we see. Among the forty or so ducks who track us around the lake, are two with no front wings! As they waddle toward us, they look like chickens. One is all white the other white with black spots. I wonder aloud if they are deformed by pollution or birth defects, but John has no idea.

During each celebratory Military event, John distributes bottles of water he purchases at his own expense. He never had the privilege to serve, but he shows his gratitude in any way he can. That includes scrubbing or repainting the benches in the rose garden when some little imp crayons on it, cleaning the headstones, picking up trash strewn about. He finds it therapeutic, as he suffers from chronic back pain, after several surgeries, including gastric bypass. That took him from 600 pounds, weight gain after repeated knee surgeries, down to 200.

John is a lifelong singer and writes poet. At work, he reconditions and repairs airplane parts. John never misses a day at the rose gardens of Webb Park. We thank him for his unsung dedication to Rancho Bernardo.

Tags: John Johnson, Rancho Bernardo, SDNN, Webb Park

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 12th, 2009 at 1:26 pm and is filed under Making RB Even Better . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.